


Acceptance

by Merfilly



Category: Star Trek
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-03
Updated: 2007-10-03
Packaged: 2017-10-09 15:06:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 428
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/88702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kirk's in the Rift, and he has time to reflect finally</p>
            </blockquote>





	Acceptance

The older man sat in his chair by the fire, watching the woman by the window, occasionally acknowledging the simmering young man with an appraising glance.

"Admiral," the young man began again, and the woman by the window walked out of the room, not wishing to share this scene again.

"David…if you can't call me 'Dad', at least cal me Jim."

"No!"

The silence fell again. They had gotten as far as they ever did for this setting. Jim nodded off, lulled by the fire, by the book he was nominally reading, and when he woke, this time, the young man was sitting near by, the woman was gone, and the fire was out.

"Why?"

Every little boy asks it, when things don't work between Mommy and Daddy. It comes with more pain when the little boy is a grown man, only just aware of the truth.

"Your mother was a dedicated scientist. I was a rising Starfleet officer." Jim looked at the young man. "I did what I could, everything but give up my stars or ask her to leave her experiments."

"I remember hating your visits," the young man told him. "You took mom away."

"Once we made the decision, she would not allow me to bond with you, to make you long for me to stay home, or make me feel the need to give up my ship."

They sat in silence then, until the young man rose and went to the window, settling there. Jim almost followed, but this never ended well when he did.

When Jim noted the scene around him again, it was the garden inside the Genesis experiment. David was lying on the grass, and looking up at him.

"It was always the careers? Never your…other love?"

Jim blinked. This never played out quite this way. But…David had been there, had seen the despair when he lost…t'hy'la, gone from him, yet never parted, save by death…

"Your mother and I were over, long before he came into my life."

David breathed out slowly. "I wondered…but never asked. Did you find happiness with him, since he shared your life in the stars?"

Jim had to stop the pain in his chest at that question. //Never parted…but we did.// "Until our lives charted different courses."

David looked up at the older man, saw the pain, and nodded once, before he was gone, and the Rift gave James T. Kirk a happier place again.

He was able to appreciate it more, having faced two of his largest regrets.


End file.
